Schwitters in Britain(January 30 – May 12) at Tate Britain is the major exhibition to examine the late work of German artist Kurt Schwitters, one of the major artists of European Modernism, who worked in several genres and media including Dada, Constructivism, Surrealism, poetry, sound, painting, sculpture, graphic design, typography and installation art. Focusing on his British period from his arrival in Britain as a refugee in 1940 until his death in 1948, the exhibition showcases over 150 collages, often incorporated fragments from packaging and newspapers, as well as sculptures and paintings. Schwitters invented the concept of Merz, ‘the combination, for artistic purposes of all conceivable materials’, and pioneered use of found objects and everyday materials in abstract collage, installation, poetry and performance. His work has influenced later British artists such as Richard Hamilton, Eduardo Paolozzi and Damien Hirst.

Schwitters was forced to flee Germany in 1937, when his work was condemned as ‘degenerate’ by Nazi government and first settled in Norway for three years. He escaped to Britain in 1940 after the Nazi occupation of Norway but had been detained as an enemy alien until his release in 1941. Then he became involved with the London art scene, engaging with British artists and critics such as Ben Nicholson and Herbert Read. In 1945 Schwitters relocated to the Lake District, and began to incorporate natural objects into his work. The move also culminated in the creation of his sculpture and installation, the Merz Barn, a continuation of his Hanover architectural construction Merzbau. The exhibition ends with commissions by artists Adam Chodzko and Laure Prouvost made in collaboration with Grizedale Arts to explore the Schwitters’ legacy.

Schwitters work using muted colours is rather understated and somehow gloomy, probably reflected the atmosphere of the war time and his life experience as a refugee. Completely oposite to the ambience of the Lichtenstein exhibition. He must be a great artist and a pioneer of modern art, and probably many people love the exhibition, but I don’t feel anything by looking at his famous collages, though I like his conventional portraits and landscape paintings (such as in FT and Guardian). His work is just not my cup of tea…

テート・モダンで新しく始まった「Edvard Munch: The Modern Eye」展（6月28日〜10月14日）は、エドヴァルド・ムンクの20世紀の作品を集めた展覧会で、主にオスロのムンク美術館から貸し出された、60点の絵画と映像・写真作品を展示している。ノルウェー出身のムンクは19世紀象徴主義の画家で、20世紀初頭のドイツ表現主義にも影響を与えたことで知られる。残念ながら彼の代表作である「叫び」の展示はないけれど、ムンクの作品の特徴である同じテーマの繰り返し、セルフ・ポートレートへの執着、そして映画や写真といった当時としては画期的なメディアや技術の作品への影響にスポットを当て、違った角度から彼の作品に光を当てている。

Tate Modern’s new exhibition “Edvard Munch: The Modern Eye” (Jun 28 – Oct 14) examines the work of Norwegian painter Edvard Munch (1863–1944) from the 20th century, including 60 paintings as well as his work in film and photography, many from the Munch Museum in Oslo – though his best known work of “The Scream“ (1893) is missing. Munch has traditionally been portrayed as a 19th-century symbolist or pre-expressionist who influenced GermanExpressionism in the early 20th century. This exhibition shows us his works from a different angle and highlights his use of single motifs, his preoccupation with self-portraiture, and the influence of contemporary media on his work.

Munch often repeated a single motif over years in order to re-work it and created several different versions, such as The Sick Child (1885–1927) and Girls on the Bridge (1902–27: in the photo above). He adopted photography in the early 20th century and focused on self-portraits, which he obsessively repeated, such as in Self-portrait: Between the Clock and the Bed(1941). Influence by technological developments in cinema and photography can be seen on much of his works, such as use of prominent foregrounds and strong diagonals, and the visual trick of figures moving towards the spectator as in Workers on their Way Home(1913–14). He also created striking effect in some of his works such as The Artist and his Model (1919–21), using electric lighting on theatre stages.In the 1930s he developed an eye disease and made works which charted the effects of his degenerating sight.

Many of his works on display are not as shocking and dreadful as The Scream, but his paintings with dynamic composition and use of deep colours scream out the same pain and anguish Munch had suffered through his life. Understated yet powerful exhibition, and I like it. → more photos: BBC

We saw a silent documentary “The Great White Silence (1924)” , the official film record of Captain Robert Falcon Scott‘s Terra Nova Expedition to the South Pole from 1910 to 1913, which opens in cinemas on May 20. The expedition’s official photographer and cinematographer Herbert Ponting filmed almost every aspect of the expedition: the scientific work, life in camp and the local wildlife. In 1924, he re-edited the footage as a narrative, introducing intertitles as well as incorporating his own stills, maps, portraits, paintings and animated models, complete with vivid tinting and toning. BFI National Archive has restored the film using the latest photochemical and digital techniques and reintroduced the film’s sophisticated use of colour.

I was no interest in expedition of any kind and was not so keen to see the movie, with very little knowledge of early South pole expeditions that I studied long time ago. I was even worried to fall a sleep during the screening, but the film was far more exciting than I expected. In addition to the lives of the expedition members who had lived 100 years ago and preparations for the journey, the film also shows us living the harsh ice lands’ creatures including funny Adélie penguins, warm interaction of mother and cub seals, killer whales chasing the cub, and newly hatched seagull chicks, as well as great landscape of the South pole such as huge iceberg and ice formation – it was vivid, dramatic and truly awesome. And the film is beautiful matched with lyrical and modern new score by Simon Fisher Turner, including pre-recorded elements and relevant ‘found sounds’ such as Terra Nova ship’s bell and scores from some of the records played by members of the expeditions using the expedition’s original gramophone. I enjoyed from the beginning til the end, on contrary to my prediction.

After the cheerful footage of the base and cute animals, Scott’s long and tough journey to the South Pole started but ended with tragedy, with huge disappoint ment after finding out that Norwegian Amundsen expedition team reached the goal first. The ending was very sad – Scott and his men ended their lives, when a fierce blizzard prevented them from making any progress, just 11 miles /18 km away from the depot. It was a well-known fact but still made me almost cry…

I am not looking for a business opportunity at the trade show, and it is a pain to get to Earl’s Court on the other side of London from me, but I always decided to go at the end because I am interested in design, though the show looks more or less the same every year. This year’s design trend seems to be “natural, warm and cozy”, using wood and earth colored textiles as well as recycle materials, rather than plasticky and artificial ‘cold’ design, used to be fashionable together with the wave of cool ‘design’ hotels.

Exhibitors are mainly private design and interior firms as well as material companies, mainly Europeans but from all over the world, but there are also some booths set up by countries and local government to boost and support their design industry. Today I put up some photos of these public booths.

Asian (South Korea and Taiwan) booths. South Koreans also had many private exhibition spaces as well. Recently, Korean companies has been getting more shares in TVs, home electronics and mobile phones in UK, and Japanese companies on the other hand seem to have been loosing its ground. Japanese government boasts its “Cool Japan” concept, borrowed from UK’s “Cool Britannia“, to sell contemporary Japanese culture to the world. However, I have rarely seen it on international design shows or other important events here in London. I have been abroad for almost 15 years, and I see a great potential in Japanese design which is simple, delicate, user friendly and often aesthetically beautiful, and am always wondering why they don’t try harder to sell them to foreign markets, especially European countries where ‘design’ is important and appreciated. Instead of concentrating on Manga or Anime, which are significantly minor than design, Japanese government should have bigger and better ambition. They could have set up a large booth at 100% Design, for example, and try to sell their design to the world – but I know Japanese are tend to be provincial and scared to go abroad (and their communication and negotiation skills with non-Japanese is usually disastrous, as well as their English), and just satisfied with domestic little success…

南米からはアルゼンチン、ブラジルが出展。

Argentine and Brazil were one of the few exhibitors from South America.